In September, oil minister Gabriel Obiang Lima warned that the government might refuse extensions of existing licences to oil companies unless they collectively invested a minimum of $2 billion in the country

While most of them want to either operate or construct or source the crude, we are looking for a company which can do all the three,” H P S Ahuja, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of India Strategic Petroleum Reserves (ISPRL) told ETEnergyworld in an interview.

The company said its full-year pretax profit climbed 6 per cent to $107.49 million from $140.6 the year before, as markets for thermal coal priced in Australian dollars soared on the back of pollution-linked output curbs in major supplier China

Chevron agreed last year to sell its stake to state-owned Sinopec before miner and commodities trader Glencore swooped in after reaching a deal with minority shareholders, who backed itand exercised preemptive rights on the sale

The company, once a global commodity trader with ambitions to rival Glencore or Vitol, has shrunk to an Asian-centric business focused on coal and freight trading after it slashed hundreds of jobs and sold prized assets to cut debt